They have discovered that the novel effect of caspase 3 in stem cells is related to its ability to activate another protein that cuts up the cell's DNA (called caspase-activated DNase) and has also traditionally been associated with programmed cell death.

On-column DNase I digestion was performed. 100 ng of each RNA sample was retrotranscribed with QuantiTect Whole Transcriptome Kit (Qiagen) and a 50-fold dilution of cDNAs was analyzed by quantitative Real Time PCR (qRT-PCR) using an iCycler-iQ5